Just went into Jay’s room to tuck him in. He was all cuddled up and sound asleep, so I ran my hand over his head like I normally do and whispered “Goodnight son, love you”.
His reply came in the form of a low rumble underneath the blanket. . . .
I just read today that poor elephants are pregnant for around a year and a half, thats just what I feel like! I still have 3 months to go before number 3 arrives and it feels like a lifetime. We found out that we were expecting when I was only 4 weeks gone, as we have both times before. Just for once it would have been nice to go to the doctors and be told that I was already 4 months gone and didn’t even know, but my body seems to go by the textbook on everything!
Its not a wonder that being pregnant is getting a little bit tiresome, I worked out that by the time this baby is born in August I will have been pregnant for 27 out of the previous 48 months. If I had known that 4 years ago i would have bought a seriously expensive and stylish maternity wardrobe instead of making do with a few pairs of ill fitting jeans and some borrowed items from friends!
To look on the upside though this pregnancy seems to be a little easier than the rest, and considering I have 2 children under 4 to look after thats a real bonus! The sickness has completely passed (except for some queasiness in the early morning) and I actually seemed to achieve a slight hint of the bloomingness (I know thats not a real word) that everyone always talks about but I never ever experienced before. So all in all life is good, but I just can’t wait until August!
The new site’s almost completely up and running now. I’m toying with the site theme and hopefully will have this up and running in the near future.
My wife, the mysteriously named Mrs. Levee, will be joining me on this blog, perhaps giving the whole thing a bit more balance!
Following a few years where I really lost my way, the last couple of months I really feel like I’ve got my Mojo back!
I’ve talked to Mrs Levee about this, and we both feel the same way. Elevated, lighthearted, happy. Life is great: we’re getting things done, designing websites with relative ease, selling stuff on eBay for a tidy profit, engaging with the kids, keeping up with the household chores and more!
A few years ago, things were completely different. I hated the firm I work for, hated the job I did. There never seemed to be enough time to do everything I wanted to do. And money. Never enough money.
Even if we got a babysitting offer, we couldn’t actually afford to go out. We’d stay in with a video.
How were we going to decorate our house? How would we be able to run two cars? What about clothes, food, incidental expenses? The list was bloody endless, believe me.
Recently though, possibly since we discovered we were expecting our third child, our outlook has changed. We’re not doing anything different that we can see. It just feels different. Almost everything is a joy at the moment. Websites, eBay, nappies, Spanish classes, work, children, wife and me - all clicking, all working together.
All I know is I feel brilliant at the moment. I spent two hours at a Spanish class last night and drove away with a huge grin on my face. Just happy to be with other people and having fun.
When I got back to the house Mrs Levee and I talked about it. Why is everything so good at the moment? Will it last? Where did the good vibes come from? All we can say is that our outlook has changed. For one thing, we’re no longer money-driven. We’re trying to experience life - not just muster through. We’re taking time to enjoy life, but bizarrely, we’re achieving much more.
If the business takes off, we’re not hoping to become rich beyond our wildest dreams - we’d both settle for me being able to run the business from home and be financially secure. Time together, and with the kids is the most important thing right now.
More and more recently, I’ve found myself walking around with that grin, like I’m ten feet tall! The Mojo is back. Long may it last!
Haisheng at This Is A Revolution posted the lyrics from Enigma’s Return To Innocence recently.
I know it’s hard to make out the words in the original song, but when you see them laid out like this, they are truly profound! Take note…
Mark at Occams Razor wrote recently about falling back on one wage when his wife was made redundant.
In our family, we had a similar dilemma. We currently operate almost exclusively on my salary. When the kids are old enough, do we pay for childcare or should Mrs Levee continue to stay at home and mind the kids full-time? If it sounds like we have a choice, you’re probably ignoring the huge cost of childcare. With two children and another on the way, if Mrs Levee went back to work, she’d be working to pay a child minder.
Fortunately, we can just about manage on the income I bring in. Mrs Levee, like Mark’s wife, has enough other interests that she uses to bring in a fair income. If my wage is the bread, Mrs Levee’s eBay activities are the butter.
The important thing, though, is that we spend a great deal of time with our children. They don’t spend all day at creche, then see us for about an hour before bedtime. Mrs Levee is with them all day, and I get home from work shortly after 3:00 in the afternoon, so we get a lot of time together. It goes without saying that we don’t live a champaigne lifestyle, but I think we have managed to focus on the important things.
We have neighbours whose kids are shunted from childcare to relatives and only see their parents briefly in the evenings and at weekends (apart from the obligatory Saturday night out). I know I’m making a value judgement here, but what about family? You’ve got both parents working their asses off to pay for all the financial committments - two cars, big mortgage, fancy clothes and the best toys for the kids. But what kind of family relationships are they building? What are their priorities?
At the moment (subject to change, hormones and the weather), things are pretty good in our house. We’re not hitting the overdraft too hard. We’re getting quite a bit done with our web design work and I’m designing a range of children’s flashcards which I’m excited about. But we’re enjoying ourseleves and not stressing about any of it.
I’m glad Mrs Levee didn’t go back to work. I’m glad I can be home for 3:00pm when most other parents get back around 6:30 or later. I’m glad that my son learns words from his mother and father and not the child-minder. And I’m glad when my daughter wants to sit on my knee and read a book together. Just recently, when I look at all the too-busy parents, I can hear “Cats In The Cradle” in my head, and I wonder if/when that type of regret will kick in for them.
I came across the Illustration Friday website while in a bit of a browsing ‘free-fall’, and thought it was worth mentioning.
Apparently the site editor submits a theme each Friday. Subscribers to the site then go away and illustrate a picture based on that theme. The theme this week is ‘ambition’.
I think if I ever find the time I might contribute to that…
We had a scan a couple of weeks ago to see how the baby was doing. (Note to Expectant Parents With Children: Not a good idea to take two under-fours to an antenatal appointment!).
The lady doing the scan couldn’t see everything she needed to see (chambers of the heart, I think), so they made another appointment for us to come in on Monday 2nd May. Good thing, because I was off due to the Bank Holiday!
So, we got to the hospital at around 12:00 in the afternoon. Kids were asleep in the car, so Mrs Levee went in by herself. And promptly came straight back out again because the scan unit was closed for the Bank Holiday too! Turns out the appointment was for Tuesday 3rd May!
So, while I was sitting in the office stewing over the latest edition of Trend Micro’s NeatSuite, Mrs Levee was having her scan. I caught up with her on the phone around 13:30 and she gave me the news - baby #3 is a boy! Well, that reduces the number of baby names to consider!
I called my parents shortly afterward, but it was a bad time. Apparently, an ambulance had arrived to pick my mother up. She’d slipped a disc a week or so ago and had been bed-ridden ever since. So I passed on my news and let them get on.
I’m a wee bit shocked. I think everyone (including me) had expected a girl, due to some of the symptoms Mrs Levee was having. (Note to Expectant Parents: Ignore the old wives’ tales!) Jay’s been a bit rowdy recently, and my immediate thought was “Not again!!!”. My next thought was, “I don’t think I know a family where there is one eldest girl and two younger boys”. I think this unsettled me, because I don’t have a frame of reference for this type of family, but it won’t perturb me for long! I’ll pop some of the scan pictures up shortly. . .
I took this photo about a year ago in London while skiving away from a conference I was on for a while. Muscovy Street is just across the road from the Tower of London and London Bridge is close by.
I think I must have been in the right place at just the right time, because the lighting was perfect and captured the statue beautifully.
The reason this all came to mind was that recently I saw the statue again on a programme (about pest control among other things). There’s a little park across the way from this where people eat their lunch on a sunny day. Apparently the litter left behind causes a bit of a rat problem.
Anyway, this is just a little experiment to test posting images to WordPress. Click on the thumbnail for a larger version.
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